Tourism slams AfriForum opposition to relief fund
The Department of Tourism has slammed lobby group AfriForum for its decision to challenge the R200m Tourism Relief Fund.
Minister Mmamoloko Kubayi-Ngubane announced the fund as a buffer for businesses in the sector which have been severely affected by the Covid-19 lockdown.
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But AfriForum has accused the department of discrimination, saying it is using race-based criteria to determine who receives funding.
The lobby group’s CEO Kallie Kriel announced earlier that they have served the department with legal papers, but Tourism spokesperson Hlengiwe Nhlabathi-Mokota says they consider the papers moot as it did not contain a case number.
“We received papers from attorneys of AfriForum, purporting to be an urgent court interdict to the Relief Fund and further indicating that we should respond by 9:00 today (Wednesday),” she says.
“Our position is that those papers, which were emailed to us, did not have a court case number, meaning there is no court process, which was initiated, and we are not able to respond to court.”
She adds that the fund is guided by BEE codes.
“The Department of Tourism is acting in accordance with Section 10 of the B-BBEE Act which makes the application of BBBEE codes of good practice mandatory.”